Harry and Ginny's Great Adventure
by Bodrugan
Summary: Harry loses his temper and blows up Aunt Marge. Ginny, separated from her family, witnesses this and together with Sirius they decide to go on the run from the law.


Harry and Ginny's Great Adventure

Chapter One: The Great Mistake

On a quiet, utterly normal street in Little Winging, Surrey, a small redheaded girl stood, looking nervously towards her destination. Taking a deep breath she started up the driveway, past the immaculate garden and expensive looking car, and peeped in the window. Inside she saw a family sat down to dinner, it looked like the kind of formal dinner she had been forced to attend at great aunt Muriel's house, she'd had to wear a very uncomfortable dress that evening.

Ginny had noticed that Harry looked beyond furious at something the rather plump woman at the other end of the table was saying. She watched on in horror, and just a little bit of pride, as the obnoxious woman slowly started to expand. She could tell that Harry had done a rather spectacular piece of accidental magic, the woman was swelling up like a hot air balloon. Ginny giggled slightly at the sight of what she assumed to be Harry's uncle, screaming and shouting, holding on, like a deranged toddler having a temper tantrum might hold on to a large helium filled balloon.

"OUT!" screeched uncle Vernon "Out of my house NOW BOY!" He shrieked as Ripper nearly succeeded in taking off his foot. But Harry had already left, going to his room and hurling his possessions into his trunk. It seemed it was only a few seconds before he was racing down the stairs with his trunk in tow. He was out of the door and halfway down the street before he noticed someone following him, a small someone with long red hair dragging an old battered trunk behind her. Harry turned, the shock causing him to lose his anger.

"G-Ginny?" he stuttered, taking in her appearance, and noticing that the holiday in Egypt had done her the world of good. She looked much healthier than she had done at the end of the last school year - after the incident in the Chamber of Secrets. Indeed she was positively glowing. Harry shook aside thoughts of how cute HIS BEST FRIEND'S LITTLE SISTER looked in that pretty little sundress and asked, "W-What are you doing here?"

"It's a long story, Harry," she sighed, looking down at her feet. She looked up suddenly. "Where are we going anyway?"

"Whoa! Ginny! Who said anything about 'we'? You saw what I did back there... I'm a criminal! They're going to send me to Azkaban for sure!" He had a panic stricken look on his face now.

"So you're just going to leave me here all on my own? Y-You don't trust me, do you?" a note of guilt sounding in her voice as tears started to fall from her eyes. "And why should you? It's my entire fault, everything. I was the one who opened the chamber. I was the one who petrified H-Hermione and C-Colin a-and P-P-Penelope" she stuttered out as a fresh wave of tears poured down her already soaked cheeks.

Harry suddenly felt overcome with guilt himself. How could he have been so thoughtless? Sure, he had his own problems, but they paled in comparison to the turmoil she must be still going through. Drawing her into his arms he hugged her to him and whispered comforting words in her ear. He told her how it wasn't her fault, that the blame belonged to Voldemort and Voldemort alone, and that everyone had forgiven her. "Listen to me Ginny. Believe me when I tell you that it's just as much my fault as yours," Harry said looking into those beautiful, deep, chocolate-brown eyes of hers. He wondered why he had never noticed them before.

"B-But it's not your f-fault," Ginny replied, her young face looking tear stained and confused.

Harry suddenly had rather strange thoughts running through his head. Thoughts of how he never wanted her to cry again, and that he never wanted to leave her side for the rest of his life. 'Is this love?' he asked himself. He had never thought about girls this way before, even Hermione, whom he considered a very close friend.

Trying to get his mind back on track, though all the while conscious of how good it felt pressed close to her, he said, "If anything it's my fault for not paying enough attention to you over the past year, so that you confided in that horrid diary. I'm truly sorry Ginny and I just hope you can forgive me. I know people have been saying about the crush you had on me, whether it's true or not I don't care," Ginny blushed scarlet at this but wasn't prepared for what he said next, " I'm sorry for not noticing how... how wonderful you are, before now." It was his turn to blush now. "In a few years time maybe we could go to Hogsmeade together, that's if... would you like to go with me?" Ginny squealed in excitement and giggled, he adored the sound and it made him go weak at the knees. He wondered why he had never felt this before, but then he remembered that he'd never heard her laugh before, and he resolved to get to know every wondrous detail about her. "Of course that's only if I get to go back..."

"Of course you'll get to go back!" Ginny protested, "and of course I'll go with you!" she exclaimed, causing Harry to grin wildly.

Just then a disturbance further up the street caught both their eyes. Several official looking wizards had appeared, from what seemed to be out of nowhere, outside Harry's Aunt and Uncle's house. They were dressed in wizard's robes and had their wands drawn.  
>"Aurors," whispered Ginny in an awed voice.<p>

"What are they?" Harry quietly asked in worried confusion.

"Dark wizard catchers," Ginny answered before saying "I wonder what they're doing here. I didn't think that they usually responded to minor things like this." They watched as the Aurors proceeded to enter the house, not noticing the two children hidden in the shadows further up the street.

"They must be after me," Harry said in a panicked voice. "What if — What if I killed her? What'll I do? They're going to send me to Azkaban!"

"No! I'm not going to let them take you away from me!" Ginny protested. "I know! We'll go on the run together. We've got all our stuff and Bill tells me that you're not exactly poor, what with the Potter inheritance when you turn seventeen and all. Come on Harry let's get out of here."

"Potter inheritance?" A bemused Harry asked quizzically once they were moving.

"Oh yes, apparently your family were one of the oldest and richest pureblood families in Britain. According to Bill the main Potter vault at Gringotts is one of the oldest and most heavily guarded. It even has a guard dragon!"

"And how does Bill know all of this?" Harry asked, grinning at her.

"Well, as one of the top curse breakers working for Gringotts, his skills were employed to increase the security on the high security vaults after that break-in a few years back."

Harry nodded and tentatively reached out and took her free hand in his. They walked on, hand in hand, for several minutes dragging their trunks along, in their free hands, behind them. They didn't want to use magic to move the trunks as it might alert the Aurors to their whereabouts, but Harry could tell that Ginny was tiring.

They were on Magnolia Crescent when they finally decided to stop, sitting down wearily next to each other on a garden wall. "So what do we do now?" Harry asked.

"Well we've got to find a way to get to London for a start and not be seen when we get there. Did Ron say you had an invisibility cloak?" Ginny enquired.

"Yes, but that won't be much use in the crowded streets. Hell it'll probably make us more obvious. People bumping into an invisible person! And it's not going to get us there in the first place is it?" Harry said dejectedly. "Anyway, speaking of travel, how did you get here? I thought that you and your family were out in Egypt,"

"Well apparently some dark wizard broke out of Azkaban, mum wouldn't tell us anything more apart from the fact that he had been heard muttering something about Egypt in his sleep. So they're closing the international Portkey service between here and Egypt to prevent his escape. We were one of the last groups of people allowed through, thanks to Dumbledore forcing the ministry because of us needing to get back in time for school. The fact that five of us are Hogwarts students, not to mention Percy being head boy, and dad being a Ministry employee, managed to sway it for us!"

"So how did you get separated, come to think of it, how did you get here of all places?" said Harry noticing her shivering slightly and pulling her closer for warmth.

"Well Dumbledore organized a Portkey for us back here, to the UK, and then another back to the Burrow. The first Portkey went fine but I managed to miss the second. Mum got a bit distracted with the twins and dad had to help Ron with Scabbers, he didn't seem to agree with the portkey journey back to Britain. Unfortunately Ron, while struggling to hold Scabbers and the portkey at the same time, managed to knock me over at precisely the same time as the portkey activated. I was left stranded in the house of a squib friend of Dumbledore's. Either because she's a squib or maybe just because of the fact that she's away for the week meant that the house wasn't connected to the floo network. Apparently it's very hard to Apparate or Disapparate close to your home, you need to be 'keyed in' or something, that's what dad said, so mum and dad wouldn't have been able to come straight for me. I had overheard them talking of how close it was to your house while we were waiting for the second Portkey and decided to pay you a visit."

"It was a mistake that you missed the Portkey right Ginny?" Harry said noticing for the first time how close they were sat together on the wall.

"The best mistake of my life," she said quietly as she leant her head closer against her shoulder.

Suddenly a loud wolf whistle sounded behind them. "Your father would be proud Harry!" a slightly rusty voice called out as the two children toppled off the wall from shock.

Before they were able to get to their feet or find out who it was, they found themselves being pulled roughly, backwards behind some bushes by, what Harry could only describe as, a vampire-like man. Harry had never met a vampire, but he had seen pictures of them in his Defence Against the Dark Arts classes, and this man, with his waxy white skin, looked just like one. If it wasn't for his hair and teeth that is. No self respecting vampire would want to be seen alive, dead, or indeed undead, in the state that this 'man' was in.

The 'man', who was now leaning over Harry, had a mass of filthy, matted hair, which reached down past his shoulders. His waxy skin was stretched so tightly over the bones of his face, it looked like a skull. If he hadn't been breathing, and had eyes shining out of those deep dark sockets, then Harry might have taken him for a corpse. He smelled like one too.

"Er, excuse me, would you mind getting off me, please." Harry said nervously, Ginny made a noise of agreement next to him.

The man gave a sharp bark of laughter. "Sure thing Harry," he said before rolling off him to sit cross legged in front of the pair.

"Thanks," Harry said a little bemusedly.

"You must get those manners from your mother. I couldn't see your father saying 'thanks' to a rather smelly stranger who'd just interrupted a snogging session..."

"You knew my mum and dad?" Harry interrupted him, clearly intrigued.

"Yes I knew them very well. The name's Sirius, by the way, Sirius Black. I was your father's best friend at school, best man at your parents' wedding, and of course I'm your godfather. Maybe, once I get a few things sorted you could even come and live with me?"

Harry was staring open mouthed at his newly found godfather. Never in a million years had he thought that something like this might actually happen. Sure he'd had his fair share of dreams about some long lost relative turning up and taking him away from Privet Drive, but he'd never really believed it. Now, out of the blue, it seemed that his prayers had been finally answered.

"Why can't I go with you now?" Harry asked, not wanting to lose his one chance of being free from the Dursleys', "Please let me come."

"And me!" said an outraged Ginny Weasley, "you're not going anywhere without me now, Mr Potter!"

Sirius sniggered at this, muttering something about him being wrapped around her little finger, but composed himself enough to reply to Harry's request, "are you sure your Aunt and Uncle won't miss you Harry?"

"I'm sure they won't, but the thing is... how can I put this...?" Harry turned to Ginny.

"Harry accidentally blew up his aunt..." Ginny began.

At this Sirius started to laugh out loud and it took Harry and Ginny several minutes of glaring at him to get him to stop.

"Okay! Alright! You were saying...?" Sirius managed to say, in between a few last bouts of laughter.

"Harry blew up his aunt Marge and ran off," Ginny explained, "and now there are Aurors swarming everywhere."

"Are there really?" Sirius asked, clearly concerned, "We should go then."

"Er, where are we going to go?" Harry asked.

"We can go to my old 'family' home, number 12 Grimmauld Place, though it's not really suitable for children. Hopefully the protections that my father put up will stop any Aurors in their tracks."

Harry's godfather got up, grabbed their school trunks, and proceeded to transport them and their luggage by apparition.

It was like being squeezed through a tight rubber tube, Harry thought, as he and Ginny were catapulted through space. They arrived with a loud cracking sound in a slightly run down old street of Georgian townhouses.

"Welcome to Grimmauld Place," Sirius announced in a slightly depressed drawl. "The old man's been gone years, let's see if the old bat has too," he said as he set off towards the house with the number 12 on its door. Harry and Ginny exchanged a glance and followed him with their trunks in tow.

Sirius spent quite some time looking at the door before he asked them, "Have either of you got your wands? I may need to borrow one for a second to open the door."

Harry reached into his pocket for his wand but Ginny had beaten him to it, handing over her own wand to Sirius.

Sirius thanked her and began waving the wand at the lock. "Hmmm, there doesn't seem to be anything too troubling on here. I would have expected my mother to have cursed the door more effectively against my return. Please stick behind me and stay very quiet." He tapped the door lock with the wand and there was a click. He pushed the door and it slowly opened.

This, Harry thought, could be the start of a great adventure.


End file.
